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Taxonomic Contributions in the "Amateur" Literature: Comments on Recent Descriptions of New Genera and Species by Raymond Hoser

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Taxonomic Contributions in the Taxonomic contributions in the "amateur" literature: comments on recent descriptions of new genera and species by Raymond Hoser 1 2 3 4 WOLFGANG WÜSTER , BRIAN BUSH , J. SCOTT KEOGH , MARK O'SHEA , & 5 RICHARD SHINE 1 School of Biological Sciences, University of Wales, Bangor, LL57 2UW, Wales, UK 2 Snakes Harmful & Harmless, 9 Birch Place, Stoneville, WA 6081, Australia 3 School of Botany & Zoology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia 4 10 Gatcombe Way, Priorslee, Telford, Shropshire TF2 9GZ, UK 5 The University of Sydney, N.S.W. 2006, Australia Reptiles and amphibians hold considerable fascination for a growing number of people. In recent years, this has led to an almost exponential increase in the number of reptile aficionados, spanning the entire spectrum from children keeping a couple of corn snakes as pets to persons professionally employed by research institutions to carry out research work on reptiles. In between are found a wide variety of individuals who do not make their living studying reptiles, but invest an often considerable amount of energy and resources into the study or husbandry and reproduction of their reptiles. It is clear that the majority of reptile enthusiasts fall into this latter group, rather than among the institutional professionals. While institutional and non- institutional herpetologists are sometimes artificially segregated into "amateurs" and "professionals", this is an artificial dichotomy which misrepresents what is in reality a continuum, as is illustrated by the list of authors of this article. The increasing size and importance of the non-institutional sector in herpetology has led to a parallel increase in the number of journals and magazines catering to this group. The contents of these "amateur" publications reflect primarily the interests of this sector in captive husbandry and breeding, but also include field reports, natural history information, and occasionally papers on systematics, including new species descriptions. Some of these publications produce primarily well-illustrated accounts for readers with little technical knowledge, whereas others publish sophisticated technical reports. They have in common that, unlike in scientific journals, the contents are not normally subjected to the process of peer-review, in which manuscripts submitted for publication are sent to other experts for comment prior to publication. From the outset, we emphasise that these publications have made a very valuable contribution to our understanding of the biology of reptiles and amphibians. None of what is written here is in any way intended to discourage participation in herpetology or the publication of observations by non-institutional herpetologists. Moreover, none of it is intended as a criticism of the editors of either Litteratura Serpentium in particular, or of amateur herpetological publications in general. However, the beneficial nature of amateur contributions in the area of systematics is more controversial. It is here that clashes have been most frequent and acrimonious. The most notorious example was the controversy surrounding the publications of Wells & Wellington (1984, 1985), who described or revalidated hundreds of species and genera of Australian reptiles and amphibians with minimal evidence. This led to attempts to have their work suppressed by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature, and resulted in years of highly publicised acrimony among herpetologists in Australia. Although the level of controversy surrounding this case was exceptional, the underlying problem is by no means uncommon (see McCranie & Wilson, 1979; Nussbaum & Raxworthy, 1996; Lötters & Vences, 2000). One non-institutional herpetologist responsible for several recent controversial descriptions has been Raymond Hoser, from Melbourne, Australia. Prior to his forays into systematics, Hoser was best known in international herpetological circles for his well-illustrated book Australian Reptiles and Frogs (Hoser, 1989), as well as for various books and other publications exposing alleged corruption in the Australian government and its authorities. None of our criticisms of Hoser's taxonomy are intended to detract from his other achievements and contributions, nor do we wish to belittle his considerable knowledge of the Australian herpetofauna. Hoser's recent taxonomic works include the description or revalidation of a number of species and subspecies of Acanthophis (Hoser, 1998a), the description of Pailsus pailsei, a new genus and species of elapid (Hoser, 1998b), the description of two new genera, two new species and seven new subspecies of Australasian python (Hoser 2000a), and the description of Pailsus rossignolii from Irian Jaya (Hoser, 2000b). All appeared in non-peer-reviewed herpetological publications. Hoser's revision of Acanthophis was critiqued by Aplin (1999), and the description of Pailsus pailsei by Williams & Starkey (1999). Many of the points in this article parallel those of Aplin (1999) and Williams & Starkey (1999). We do, however, feel that this is appropriate, given subsequent developments and the largely separate readership of Litteratura Serpentium and The Monitor. In a similar vein to Aplin (1999), we aim to establish what might be regarded as sensible standards for the description of new taxa in herpetology. The recent works of Hoser will be compared to these, and their deficiencies analysed. Finally, we offer some recommendations on systematic works in the amateur literature. DESCRIBING SPECIES AND GENERA Nomenclatural versus biological validity of new species Describing new species is both easy and difficult. Conforming to the formal rules is easy, writing a description that is convincing to others may be much more difficult. A frequent source of confusion concerns what constitutes a "valid" description. In order to discuss this, we need to distinguish between the validity of a description under the rules of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, and the biological reality of the species involved. Although many non-systematists imagine the description of species and taxonomy in general to be highly regulated, this is not the case. Certain taxonomic acts, including the description of new species, subspecies or genera are subject to a set of rules, the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, published by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature in London. In addition to the publication of the Code, the Commission has powers to rule on aspects of the interpretation of the Code in case of doubt, and may override some of its provisions for the purpose of furthering the stability of the nomenclature. However, the vast majority of taxonomic activity does not involve any interaction with the Commission. For a new species name to be valid under the Code, the description needs to fulfil only a few basic criteria: 1. It needs to be published in a manner that ensures multiple identical copies that can be obtained for free or purchased. Web pages do not qualify, neither do manuscripts. 2. It needs to contain the name of the new species, in Latin letters, and a clear indication that the author does indeed intend to describe the species as new. 3. A holotype must be designated. 4. A diagnosis must accompany the species name. This simply means that features supposedly distinguishing the new species from others must be indicated. Note, however, that no standards for these diagnoses apply: a single sentence is enough. If the supposedly diagnostic features are actually inadequate for the purpose, this does not affect the validity of the description under the Code. If a description of a new species fulfils these requirements, then the name is validly published and available under the provisions of the Code. The question of the biological validity of a species is a different set of problems. Although biologists argue frequently about what exactly a species is and how it should be defined, most would agree that a species is fundamentally an independent evolutionary lineage (de Queiroz, 1998). Some prefer diagnosing such lineages on the basis of reproductive incompatibility, others on the basis of diagnostic characters, others based on molecular evidence, but the fundamental question is the same. The point is that the description of a new species must not only satisfy the criteria of the Code to make the new scientific name available, but it must also convince readers that a "real" biological lineage is being described. The important point is that a validly published name and a biologically valid species are not the same thing. It would, for instance, be entirely possible to describe every single population of tree frog from western Europe as a distinct species, diagnosing it on spurious grounds such as "slightly darker than species A, slightly larger than species B". Such descriptions would be valid under the provisions of the Code, but, of course, they would be biologically absurd. For a new species description to be useful as well as nomenclaturally valid, it needs to convince the reader that what is being described is indeed a biologically valid species. This is best accomplished by providing adequate information on the new species, its variability, and comparing this with the variability of the most similar and closely related species. In other words, sufficient evidence must be presented to justify the description of the new species. Thus, in addition to the formal requirements of the Code, an adequate description normally
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